The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1887-12-06

cases where State officers are guilty of acting in
violation of them because the United states deals
with them as individuals owing obedience TO its
authority. The penalties of disobedlence
may be visited upon State officers
without regard TO the character in
which they assume to act, or the nature OF ex-
emption they may plead. Nothing can be inter
posed between an individual and the obhga-
tion he owes to the constitution and laws OF tue
United States. If, therefore. a state officer,
under color of State laws, comes into confilct
with the superior authority and valid laws OF the
United States, he is stripped of his representa-
tive character and subjected to the consequences
of his conduct. state has no power TO mpart
to him any immunity from responsibility 10 the
supreme law of the United States
CONCLUSION OF THE OPINION.
The opinion concludes as follows:
In contradistinction to these classes of cases
for the reasons given we adiudge the suit or
Cooper ct al. against Marye ct al, in when
iniunctions were granted against the present
petitioners to be suit against the State or Vir-
ginia. 1t is therefore within the prohibition OF
the eleventh amendment BY the terms or thaC
provision IL is a case 10 which the judicial
rover Of the r United ed. States e,t does ,ees
without jurisdiction to entertain IT,
All proceedings in exercise OF the jurisdiction
which il assumed are null and void. The orders
forbidding the petitioners TO bring suits, LOT
bringing which they we're adjudgedin contempt
of its authority, it had no power to make
The orders adjudging them in contempt are
equally NOlu, ana tneH imprisonment u NlbllouV
authority of the law, it is ordered, therefore,
tina the petitioners be discharged
JUSTICE FIELDS DIssENTs IN PART.
As soon as this announcement was made
many of the spectators began fling out, and
the Marshal had to rap for order several
times during the reading of the early por-
tions of Justice Fields opinion dissenting
from some of the views expressed in the
opinion read by Justice Mat
thews, though not from, the con
clusion reached. In his opinion
Justice Fields says that he concurs in the
main position upon which the discharge of
the petitioners is founded, namely, that the
suit was one against the State of Virginia
itself, and therefore in violation of the
eleventh amendment. He made this special
concurrence, however, because of the
language in the ma jority opinion expressing
approval of the position taken by the court
in Louisiana against Jumel, from
which he dissented That case he con-
sidered as brought to compel the
officers of the State to do what she had CON
sented they might be required to do by
judicial tribunals. He adhered in every
respect to what he had then said expressing
his conviction of the invalidity and uncon-
stitutiouality of the ordinance of reputation
embodied in the new constitution OF
Louisiana, and also in his opinion of the
equally invalid legislation Of Virginia, as
expressed ia Antoni vs. Greenhow.
Justice Harlan said that he adhered to his
dissenting opinions in the cases of Antoni
VS. Greenhow, Louisiana VS. Jumel and
Cunningham VS. the Macon and Brunswick
Railway Company, and therefore dissented
from the opinion and Judgment in this case.
He expressed the view that suits brought in
the Circuit Court of the United States were
not suits against the State of Virginia
within the meaning of the eleventh amend
unent